Translating Goals into Measurable Objectives: Research Studies and Practical Procedures.

Romney, Leonard C.; Micek, Sidney S.

Two studies were done about the selection of specific measures for use in institutional goal translation and evaluation processes; in addition, they provided prototype methodologies for setting objectives. The first, "Institutional Goal Achievement: Measures of Progress" (IGA), suggested by its results that the process of setting goals and measuring progress would benefit from consensus-building techniques, whether in individual institutions, among institutions of one type, or across institutional types. The second, The Higher Education Outcome Measures Identification Study (OMIS), studied and developed procedures for collecting outcomes and associated measures deemed most important to different types and levels of decisionmakers. The procedures of these two studies can be useful in goal translation, and, in addition, important insights can be gained about the outcomes information preferences and needs of postsecondary education participants and constituents when the measures are used as research tools. (Author/MSE)